Time to engage in some (Not So) Passive Aggression

The newest expansion for Outrider is finally here. After months and months of design and redesign and playtesting and replaytesting, I finally settled on a deck of twenty new weapons to augment the Outrider experience. These weapons change Outrider from a 'dogfight' styled engagement by giving the players new choices for attack or diverting an enemy. Over the course of the next few weeks, I will try to highlight some of the new gear and begin to show how it works within the game and how it can be a great complement to the other two expansions.

First Up: Passive Weapons

Dropped objects (mines, oil, etc) were elements that were in my mind during the creation of the base game. I knew that the maneuver card system lended itself to having 'attack' maneuvers. Actually, in early prototypes of the game, shooting attacks were maneuver cards as well (it was the short straight that eventually became 'ease up'). slicks, catrops and other 'secret agent' type deterrents are pretty much at the core of all car combat media we have seen over the years - anything from James Bond, Car Wars, MarioKart to Death Race.

The typical use for these weapons is to give the faster builds (Interceptor, Gunslinger, Renegade, Raider, etc) a rear weapon in the absence of one, as the droppers do not require a hardpoint to be attached. They also can be attached to vehicles with rear weapons, making for some super deadly Linebackers out there(!)

What They're Best At

The dropped weapons are good for controlling you enemy, creating a barrier that keeps them away or at least makes them take a path that is more advantageous for you. Even seasoned drivers can have major difficulties and lasting effects crossing dropped items. Especially when combined with critical effects from the Dealin' Damage deck, a vehicle's stats can be stripped away quickly, even with no armor lost.

Now vehicles with no rear weaponry can deter followers!

Be Careful

Dropped substances can be dangerous for everyone, even the vehicle dropping the substance. Slicks/etc remain in play as severe hazards and any vehicle that contacts or loses control on a dropped substance runs the risk of suffering the bad effects.

So augment your gameplay and pickup the (Not So) Passive Aggression Weapons Deck from the Bolt-Ons page.

Next time: we discuss Auxiliary Weapons

-G

Outrider Gets Wired + Updates are coming(!)

Outrider Reviewed on Wired.com's Geek Dad Blog

One thing I noticed early on in developing Outrider is that everyone loves HotWheels. Young, old (regardless of gender, I might add) when we demo the game with the diecast cars, everyone stops to look. I'll be honest, I didn't envision Outrider as a family game, but when your primary playtest group is your family, then it should be no surprise that the game evolved that way. I spent the better part of a year playing with a (then) 13 and 7 year old, who lovingly found every way to break the game. ;)

Thanks to James Floyd Kelly, of wired.com's GeekDad Blog. He posted a review of Outrider on the blog site today. During the recent OGRE Kickstarter campaign, I was told by a few Outrider fans that my game had come up in the post-success discussion that was flooding Steve Jackson's OGRE comments, since his company had dangled the Car Wars carrot in front of the faces of the potential OGRE supporters (some people bid only to fund a future Car Wars release, with no interest in receiving a copy of OGRE, lol). I submitted a review copy to James, to help with his Car Wars withdrawal until Uncle Stevie launches that campaign in 2013. I enjoy Wired's blog, because the focus of many of the board game reviews are centered on integrating hobbyist gaming into the family and as a gamer, this is a passion of mine.

I have been floored by the enormous response from (gamer) parents thanking me for creating a game that introduces tactical choices in a way that is tactile and visible, giving kids (and people like me) the ability to plan /react on the fly. One dad rejoiced in telling me that his kids would spend their whole turn telling him what THEY were going to do NEXT turn - no other game he had tried to had hooked his kids into thinking ahead ... not very close to the vest, but hey those kind of subtleties come later(!)

To help bring more kids to the table, anyone who purchases Outrider and enters 'geekdad' into the paypal transaction memo will get $2.00 off the bundle price ... welcome to the family!

(Not So) Passive Aggression Expansion is Coming Soon!

cough ... cough ...

The final touches are being put in place and I'm gearing up to release the next expansion for Outrider. At one time, I had thought of separating the expansion into smaller bits, by weapon types - one deck for oil slicks and other dropped weapons, another for rockets/missiles, but it feels more complete this way, the combined deck provides a greater variety of way to further customize your chassis ... combined with the Tuner Deck, we have managed to make some very scary vehicles. Even when randomly drawing both a Tuner Card and an Auxiliary Weapon, we managed to come up with some surprising combinations that made for (ahem) unique tactics on the tabletop.

The Road Ahead: Kickstarter

I've altered my release plans a bit, due to the recent rise in boardgames as Kickstarter campaigns. Alot of great indie designs are seeing the light of day, complete with pretty boxes and beautiful, pro-quality cards. I decided it was time to try and take the 'Print' out of 'Print and Play.' By the end of the year, I hope to have raised the funds, to publish a real, honest-to-goodness boxed copy of Outrider that will look impressive among your copies of Fantasy Flight games. To this end, some minor changes are coming to keep the component count and complexity down and all these changes will be freely available in PDF form to all those who have supported the product from its humble roots.